Glenn
I bought a truck out near you over the week-end...On the Nevada California Line...Near Reno...Says there is a road that goes through to Yosemite..But it is closed from November to June...Seasonal...
Is this true? is it gravel or paved...If I can get time off to come get the truck I was going to head out to the underground headquarters for a "inspection"
The park is quite large...What town are you closest to...
Near as I can figure the Truck is on US 395 on the state line...So it is not very far from the Park..Maybe 2 hours???
I just wonder if the skies can handle all the helicopters if we team up...Maybe they will start bumping into each other ;)
It will stink if I have to get the truck shipped...I need a vacation...Good time to hit the road with the wife away working...Just make sure you tell all the ladies out there I am not single...Hehe ::)
The road to yosemite is now open from 6 AM to 8PM - yes - it is pretty good except a short section by the rock slide - 2 one lane temporary bridges -- they are to be open with stop lights 24 hours per day soon. One way traffic so short waits right now. I'm in Mariposa abot 40 miles West of Yosemite. I'll send you my numbers if you know you are coming out.
This is the helo capitol of the world right now - fires in Yosemite. (https://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d184/glennkangiser/P1000794.jpg)
I'm under their flight path -- I love it.
The road through the park is paved but watch your speed -- we have mean overzealous Park Rangers. Can you drive the truck? There is no commercial trucking through Yosemite. Probably can't haul one. There is another pass at Sonora which may be an option then come down 49 to Mariposa.
The ladies around here shouldn't be too much problem. Most of them already have girlfriends. :-/
Thanks for the info Glenn
You know I could drive the truck if I wanted to go over the brakes and work on it for a day...The truck needs a clutch so I would have to pull the trans and re-install it...I should be able to do that and the brakes in one day... I am undecided whether to load up the tool box and hop on the bus with a new clutch and some brake shoes in my overnight bag...and head west...Work on the truck...get it running and then do some sightseeing and tour around..
Or I could load up one of my trucks here and drive the 2600 miles out there...I would much rather just get on the bus and work on it out there...People shake their head when they find out I am going to work on a field truck and drive it home a couple thousand miles... I used to do it all the time...Usually if you look hard you can get amazing deals on stuff that needs minor TLC....
I bought a 4x4 for $400 that has a complete rebuilt motor.. guy put the clutch in backwards :o....That truck back here in SC is worth about $4000
So if I can incorporate it into a vacation I am all for it...$100 for the bus trip out...Pack a lunch in my bag for the 2 day ride....Bring the parts and my box of tools and head out...
If all goes well I should be able to go out, and back for about $1000....Which is a little less than what a long haul shipper would want...But I would get a vacation out of it and maybe find some more rust free vehicles for more trips...
I am wanting to find an old yard where there are a bunch of old cars waiting for me to bring them back to life...There are all kinds here...Just too rusty... I know that there has to be a few yards out there where pack rats have gathered stuff for the last 30 years....I need to get out into the boonies and find a couple places like that.... I would like to buy a dozen cars a year out there...
Do less repair work for the public and more resto work for myself....Just that 50's cars here are hard to find that are fixable...
I hinted around that you might find a couple old treasure troves for me...But no luck from you yet...So I have to try to get my butt out there to dig around...
I wonder if we could bribe a black helicopter operator to take us out to look from the air...Imagine that both of us in a black helicopter... ;D
Sassy would have to get a picture for the website
Keep me posted -- there are other good roads from Reno area.
There is a closed wrecking yard here - old fellow died- I don't know what is going t happen to the rest of the cars . I have a buddie who may know of stuff --- we are on the edge of the boonies.
I tell you truthfully...it does not matter if it is an old coke Machine, gas Pump or an old car...The best part is beating the bushes looking....Feels like we are pirates looken for illusive mysterious undiscovered treasure... It can be a lot of fun to restore and use the old things we dig up....But the joy of discovery cannot be matched, IMHO
Aye Matey! ;)
You'll have a rough time here -- History started here with the Gold Rush -1849 --- Many old towns -buildings - history -- stuff --around every corner. That is why I love the chance to work on the old buildings -- square nails are even a thrill -- stopped making them regularly in about 1890. They are used in a place I'm on now.
Square nails = work better + much harder to make by machine????
They were replaced by wire nails in about 1890 but are still available as cut nails and or concrete nails where they cut then harden them - made on the same type machine as the pre- 1890 nails.
I guess you and Sassy will have to try hard not to be nice to me when I get out there...So as to make me not want to stay!!!
The lower part of South Carolina is for the most part still undeveloped and there are a lot of colonial houses and flea markets that are not filled with stuff from the dollar store...
I hate those flea markets...All new taiwan junk....It is nice to be able to buy a bedroom set that is made of 1005 solid real wood...Not glue and carboard
If something has a history it just seems better....Something about nostalgia I guess....
Just let me know when you'll be here, Benevolance & I'll try to be prepared... You & Glenn in the same geological spot on earth may cause it to tilt or the magnetic fields will shift for sure (they are already shifting, the 2 of you together may just push them over the edge) or.... who knows? I'm sure you two will find plenty to talk about - you'll enjoy all Glenn's toys & junk, too! Anyway - we have plenty of room, so... hope to see you!
PS Maybe we'll figure out solutions to all the problems of the world ;)
Sassy
A couple bottles of wine or a case of beer and I am sure Glenn and I can solve all of the world's problems...Get a tape recorder ready! ;) I am sure we can come up with some doozies...
Mail em off to the white house and it really will be helicopter central..
I am really looking forward to seeing the cob structures around the place...They fascinate me...Plus Glenn is a welder... Welder types sort of gravitate towards each other....
My wife believes that people have a magnetic resonance about them...And that we all attract, affect and pull others around us towards us...Maybe she is right... Whenever people come over here it is Gadget time and we work on welding stuff or making beer... whatever... The more people that come over here for Gadget time the more I enjoy messing around with junk...It is an out of control cycle really... Maybe my wife has a theory there that it's weight in salt?
Too deep and profound for me...I am simply a packrat mechanic that makes beer...
Are you guys packrats too...It seems most of my friends from off the net have pack-rat-itis...I have it bad..Drives my wife off the deep end
Any tentative time yet, Peter? I'll try and work my work schedule around your trip. Local winery has some mean stuff if we can catch them around the place.
Well, more than 2 or 3 beers & he might be snoring ;D ! Last year for our anniversary, Glenn bought a special bottle of wine at a local winery... anyway, I drank a 1/2 wineglass while in the hot tub & then another 1/2 glass when we got back to the cabin... this was over a 3 hour time-period :-? - that was some STRONG wine... the room was spinning, I was spinning... :-[ Glenn just laughed at me... :-/
Glenn is the King of packrats ;D
I have a pretty good collection, Peter. Runnable steam engine - sawmill - 2010 McCormick Deerings and one lungers at the other place - about an acre of stuff over there. I'm working on my first acre of stuff over here including a TD15 dozer - Cat 112 grader --plenty of stuff to keep us occupied -- or we can look for more. :-/
Sassy failed to mentioned that after I gave her the nice bottle of expensive 17% wine, she drank two half glasses and went to see Ralph. :-/
She is truly a wino. :)
Who is Ralph?
Dozers are Cool! my dad has a td 15..Nice Sized Dozer...Big enough that if the neighbors bother you.. open the throttle aim lower the blade and hop off... They should get it stopped about 2 miles down the road...no more neighbors...just like David Copperfield....Magic! Isn't a TD 15 about the Same Size as a D-6 maybe just a smidge larger?
Of all the machinery he had as a kid my favorite was a TD-9 it was the one that was a crawler loader...It would do a lot of work...Versatile..Super easy to run... I love the one lung engines...I do not have any of that sort of thing. I do have a homemade forge that I barely have time for... I have a PTO for the 4x4 here in my yard and I would like to build all the accesories to run off the PTO...Cement mixer, bushhog, woodpslitter...generator....Which would allow a guy to go to the woods to build a cabin and be pretty self sufficient....A little 4x4 would allow you to do a lot of work....I have enough stuff to build the woodsplitter...When time allows...I will gather the materials for the rest in time...baby steps I guess.
I would love to build a woodworking shop....My Grandpa used to make gorgeus furniture when I was a boy...He would get us to cut maple Oak and birch off the woodlot at my dads for him...He would mill it with the mill he made himself (machinist by trade) stack it dry it and use it a couple years later. I would go visit and he would teach me a few things...Make me sand and paint..He hated to sand....
I inherited his homemade lathe edger, planer, and table saw...I would love to spend time making footstools and magazine racks....Great stress reliever...But it will have to wait a decade I guess....No way I have the time or space to build the wood working shop just yet
I am not a big wine drinker...especially not the rich red stuff...The smell of it is too much for me... I can tolerate some dry whites...I am a simple man beer, beer, beer....
I can say things like that ( I am simple) hehe because my wife does not come here or post here...Which is nice because she would not miss that beachball.
We had a barbeque a few weeks ago and friends came over and brought their guitars and we drank bews and grilled...And it was great until someone said in all seriousness...."Isn't it great the job Bush is doing with the Country"....Well sober I would have half a mind to throw the relative off the place...Tipsy...It is a wonder I let them live...hehe...I am pretty harmless...I just asked him to repeat the statement a few times...When he asked why I said....I was checking to see if my ears were working....I could not believe anyone would say that...We got to talking...I told him Bush was Hitler Re-incarnated...He got a little upset when I asked him if he wore Swatzika's when at home...
I hope all your friends and family are not hardcore republicans....The difference between a democrat and a republican is that a Democrat would vote for a Republican if they were they felt that their presidential hopeful was not suited for the job...A Republican would for the most part agree that Bush is a Psycho...And vote for him anyway...They would rather have a corrupt psychopath for a president that was republican than a half decent moderate that would do a fair job that was not a republican...
ahh good times....Sitting around the campfire quoting the constitution, or the declaration of independance.... Would yer neighbors think of us as nutso or what?
Some people fight their sickness and addictions...I gave into mine long ago...I love being a packrat...I cannot drive my truck to town on garbage day without loading something up off the side of the road....
When I go to the dump I usually look on the back of other people's truck in the line...my wife thinks I am a weirdo...
Yardsales and Estate sales you might as well pour honey all over the picnic basket for the ants to swarm....
I even save newspapers...I have boxes and boxes of them...My wife pitched a fit and made me take them out of the house...I dunno why I saved 2 years worth of newspapers...But I loaded them up in one of the cars out in the yard to stay out of the doghouse...Hehe...Started another pile upstairs in the house...
I know I will not read them again...Yet I keep them for some strange reason....It is a sickness... Old windows doors and lumber other people were throwing away is piled up in the storage barn.....Before I moved here I filled my Fathers house with old furniture I bought and my grandmothers 2 car 2 storey garage with antiques...I have a problem....But dammit it is so much fun to collect and find neat stuff....
I do the same thing with cars....When my wife complains I tell her at least I do not collect women ;D... not yet at least
Glenn
I talked with the guy in Nevada today we are going to shoot for sometime within the next month...I will keep ya posted!
The papers can be made into papercrete, - soon you will have enough for a wall or something. www.papercrete.com should have some ideas for you. :-/
We have got a few relatives to pull their heads out of the sand and look at the things our leaders are doing in the name of the United States. No wonder 3/4 of the world hates us, but some will hear nothing of it. Occasionally they may mention something like they have seen a flicker of light.
Sassy's dad said that his official Air Force news mentioned that there were around 5 times the wounded that are officially being reported by the Pentagon (over 120,000 last February). He said "So they've been lying to us" This is one of the few comments he's made - he retired in '72 and has a hard time thinking that not everything our leaders do is right. Made a few more comments recently.
Glenn
It is hard for someone that has served... Think about it...You sign up.. put your life on the line when you are young, impressionable, passionate....And so many young men and women die...It is hard to think that the ones we love are dying for nothing...
That truth is too hard for many to ever come to terms with and accept. To say that the Vietnam war or Iraq War was wrong would be like saying their Son/daughter/father/brother/ cousin died for nothing.... The lives of the lost mean so much that they cannot come to the truth of it and hold dear to their falsehoods.
On a lesser scale you have the same phenomenon happening with those that served...They have a hard time acepting the sacrifices they have made and the tough things they have seen and been through was all for naught...
The thing is that they strip young men down...Shave em strip em hose em down and powder them for ticks... Naked as the day they were born they break them...Wear them down.... so they can build them back up....They start throwing words around like Freedom and democracy...and when they are finished drilling the young men and women they would all lay themselves down on their swords as it were for whatever cause they are told to die for...
They are not trained to question orders, but to follow and trust that everything is in the name of freedom and democracy
It has been happening for hundreds of years this war machine mentality...Napoleon was famous for it...
One of my best friends here is a hard core republican and he hates bush...Which is a bit of a shock...But he voted for him twice knowing he was a crooked Psycho...
It is very frustrating talking with him...He knows the Iraq war was a lie...But says doozies like....Voting republican keeps america free from unions taking over the country...He really believes that the democrats are controlled by the labour union.
Or that if you vote Democrat you jeopardize the men and women already in Iraq..... Gee how is voting to bring them home more dangerous than voting to leave them over there exposed and vulnerable to attack?
I just shake my head sometimes....Common sense is not common or sensible it seems.
I believe that we should defend our country and families, but for real threats. I do not think we should be attacking sovereign nations for fascist interests -- military and big corporate business -- while the sons and daughters of the lowly working class go out to be cannon fodder.
I agree that a career military person would have a hard time believing that what he was ordered to do wasn't right and that the brainwashing of boot camp destroys their ability to think for themselves but I also think that when reality sets in they realize it for themselves and this is what makes the personality of the returned vet the way it is. Some are able to live with it --some don't do so well.
Add to that the damage DU is doing to them even though they are told it is safe, and you have an even more unfair situation for them. At least George was able to skip the danger part.
Yeah isn't ironic that George can say he served his country ::) Yet because he was the son of a senator he did not have to go to war.. heck he did not even have to serve the last year of his tour of duty
Funny thing the way the rich and powerful get excepted from the rules. Why it is shocking! :o :o :o
Okay so the sarcasm was a bit thick there...I agree 100% that the working class is expected to die in these skirmishes so that the Rich and powerful can benefit when they take control of the resources and get contracts to build munitions here or rebuild the country over there.
It was easy in WWII Hitler was a Maniac...Killing everyone, Not just the Jews...Huge misconception...Hitler did not just want to kill Jewish people...All kinds of people were on the Kill Torture and abuse list...Anyone with a brain or an opinion was to be imprisioned or killed...He hated activists, politicians, Homosexuals..The French...Even people in the Church other than Jews were being eliminated...He hated most everyone...Sadly the Jewish People took the brunt of this Hatred and they suffered immeasurable losses...Today when they talk about Hitler and WWII usually the only thing that is mentioned is the Holocaust...The losses of the Russian Army were 4 times higher in total than the amount of Jewish people Killed by the Nazi's...I have read several books on the losses and most put the number of Jewish deaths at 5 million...But some say it was much higher....I have tried to determine this, but is very ambiguous and 65 years later it is hard to pinpoint...We do know that the number of Soviet russian Deaths is in excess of 20 million....Which consisted of 13 million soldiers and 7 million civilians being killed... The USA lost exactly 407,318 people to WWII...292,131 were soldiers :o....A mere drop in the bucket to what the rest of the world suffered
It was easy to see that he needed to be stopped...It was easy to see the crimes and the Evil he was responsible for....No amount of brainwashing or propaganda was needed...The whole world came together to stop Hitler...
Kind of like in the Film Independance day....It is funny but the country that lost the greatest amount of lives and spent the most on the war was Russia....The Russians showed a dedication that can hardly be believed...They suffered 3 deaths for every German....But they fought relentlessly and Single handedly broke the bulk of the German Army on the Eastern Front late in the war...When Hitler turned to the east.
And immediately after the war...The Same soviet Amry that Selflessy died for Freedom, Democracy and the American way was the root of all evil....Stalin was not a benevolent leader....But he was the Hero of WWII....This is never portrayed by the British or the American Histories of the War...At the Conference of Yalta Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt agreed to carve up Eastern Europe before the war was over or Germany Defeated....Ten years alter under McArthy Communism was evil....In Yalta it was a Savior
Even in WWII The USA did not get involved until the end and made sure that amount of fighting took place on American Soil (pearl harbor aside) from 1938 until 1944 America was content to lend out money to several sides for war munitions...Called the Lend-Lease Suplies...50 billion worth...To England, Russia, and China.
I guess they were perfecting the fighting techniques for what we have seen since...Korea, Veitnam, Iraq....Fight on foreign soil.. blow it to pieces and get paid to rebuild it...the Soldiers come from the working class and the elite get rich off the trivial conflicts...
An't Democracy great? >:(
We went for a drive today - actually yard saling then decided to head through the woods - no--- Sassy wasn't feeling amorous --just wanted to go sightseeing.
We ended up on top of Ferguson ridge just above the rock slide that closed the road to Yosemite. They now have 2 bridges in and one way traffic across the river and back 24 hours per day - short wait between signals.
(https://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d184/glennkangiser/P1010050_edited.jpg)
Loren Baritz' Backfire talks a lot about a) why we were programmed to lose in Viet-Nam and b) why it was so incredibly difficult to understand.
A big one is our belief in TECHNOLOGY. We had better technology, so we couldn't have lost.
Also--every time the North Vietnamese fought on our terms they lost.
They didn't lose when they dragged guns through the jungle using hundreds of people--instead of fancy technology. We tended to consider that disgusting, unfair, and besides we shouldn't count that, it wasn't an army.
And army headquarters lied to themselves about so much--the infamous one was body counts--that they couldn't really believe that we weren't winning. And one tends to believe some of what our commanders, supervisors, top brass says, even when we know it's not all true. In this case, it may have been very liittle.
I highly recommend getting the book (ex-library copy is good, decent paper, etc., price tends to be right--it may also come in used mass market paperback--there the print is smaller, the paper may have already started to disintegrate). Although it may just make you feel ill.
(N.B.--the number of soldiers we have in Iraq is grossly underestimated when compared to other wars, because of the many jobs that have been given to "contractors." E.G., food services.)